


One Dishonorable Thing

by saltwatersheep



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Neighbors, Angst, Eventual Smut, Friends to Lovers, Grief/Mourning, Healing, Margaery Tyrell is a Good Friend, Multi, POV Brienne of Tarth, Slow Burn, Stream of Consciousness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:35:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22193413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltwatersheep/pseuds/saltwatersheep
Summary: Brienne is getting ready for a first date with her neighbor, Jaime. They have known each other for a year. There will be fun elements, but she’s also mourning the loss of a friend in this universe. As she’s getting ready, old insecurities flare up, memories come to her unbidden, and a good friend is called in to save the day. Will Brienne make it the five steps across the hall to Jaime’s apartment for their date? Will she be able to get over the grief, insecurities, and the memories to triumphantly take what she wants: a piece of the golden lion, himself? Only time will tell…
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Renly Baratheon/Loras Tyrell
Comments: 18
Kudos: 43





	1. A Knight on a Fine Gray Palfrey

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first ever fan fic and I'm excited to wet my feet in the wonderful world of Jaime and Brienne! 
> 
> This is a modern AU, but I won't be dwelling too much on the specifics of the world they live in. This fic lives very much in Brienne's head and she will be the only POV. I took a silly idea I had (that Brienne would be going on a first date with Jaime and silky nightgowns would be involved: TBD) and it ended up being an exploration of grief and the insecurities that I feel Brienne would be living with in this modern world. This story takes place on the day of the date--as she's getting ready--and during the date itself (eventually). The memories that Brienne experiences aren't linear. Certain things happening on this day will trigger certain memories for her and she'll relive them, a bit. 
> 
> I don't have a Beta because I'm so new so please let me know if you'd be interested in working with me! I would love to read other folks' work, too! Thank you! :)

Brienne Tarth was lying on the floor of her apartment’s small hallway in full-on panic mode. Her long, long, freckled limbs flung out and spread from one end of the small passage to the other. She looked like an impossibly large corpse, dead to the world, yet somehow still shivering nervously, her teeth chattering in her mouth. _Too large mouth._ She couldn’t help thinking.

 _Maybe this is a dream,_ she thought. Maybe she would wake up on a battlefield somewhere: a knight covered in armor and blood. For it surely felt like she’d gone through hell and back. It seemed impossible to be here, preparing for a first date with the neighbor she’d loved stupidly for a year. How could she possibly prepare herself for _that?_

In times of stress, she couldn’t help but find herself delving back into her boundless imagination. It was silly and girlish—indulgent even—to daydream of knights and battles, love found and lost. To dream of blood and glory and the wind running through his glorious golden mane...

 _Shit,_ she thought. Would she get to run her hands through that beautiful hair tonight? Would she run them down, down over his wonderfully hard chest and down, her big hands venturing even further still…

Is this reality or was she dreaming? Was she Brienne of Tarth: a knight clad in blue, ugly still, but bold and brave? “Brienne the Beauty?” No, she was a 21st Century girl splayed out on her hallway floor before a first date with a man who looked like half a god and she’d loved for a year, confused and buzzing with….

_Something._

Had she had anything to drink yet today? 

Were these pure nerves or was she dying? Since when did she have such a flair for dramatics? Wasn’t she the even-keeled one? She was the reliable tenant in the building, the one who always needed to remind her beautiful neighbor, _Jaime_ , to close his windows when it began to rain or turn down his heat to save money in the winter. Yes, dramatics were more Jaime’s style. Jaime with the golden hair and lost limb that made her love him even more, somehow.

Brienne wasn’t afraid of much these days. Her imposing physique (she was well over six feet tall) combined with her athleticism and self defense training made it easy for her to embrace almost any challenge _or challenger_ that dared step in her way. But admitting to these feelings for her neighbor, now _that_ was something to be afraid of. Hadn’t love always bit her in the ass, anyway? 

She was different now compared to the last time she’d been truly in love—ten years ago. She’d been 20 years old then: naive, romantic, ugly, and hopelessly in love with her gay best friend, Renly. 

_Still ugly now,_ she thought. Though these days she was in therapy, doing the adult thing, trying to move on from that particular brand of darkness. “Body Dysmorphia,” her therapist had called it. Past trauma. Grief. _All of that and still ugly,_ she thought. Most of all, in the ten years since falling for Renly, she’d tried to have more realistic expectations of love. 

Back then, she’d allowed herself to daydream, pretended she was deserving of a man like Renly: beautiful and vain and confident. But he had been gay—and that was just fine—maybe better, even, because he didn’t have to lie to her and tell her it wasn’t her looks, or the five inches she towared above him, that would keep them apart. He loved Loras and for that she was truly glad. 

Instead of embarrassing her like all of the other men she had nursed school girl crushes on, they became best friends. In truth, Renly could relate to her awkwardness. Though he had been undeniably beautiful with big brown eyes and shaggy curls; he understood what it was like to be different. 

Renly had grown up parentless. _Was she a magnet for motherless children?_ He’d just had two older brothers—much older—and suffered from their expectations and testosterone. Stannis had been better than Bobby, but only slightly. At least Stannis had accepted him when he’d come out; unlike Bobby who barely looked at Renly again with anything other than thinly veiled disgust and cracked constant jokes, at Renly’s expense, about what it was like to have sex with men. 

* * *

_Renly._ Why was she thinking of Renly, now? She’d been half mad with nerves minutes ago. She was still lying stupidly on the floor, though she’d moved, without noticing, into a fetal position. Her arms were crossed so tightly around her; it was like she was trying to keep her innards from spilling out. Maybe she was an injured knight afterall: gutted. _Alone._

Renly. He’d died when they were twenty-five. It always came back to him, her best friend, in these moments of importance in her life. _Would today be important?_ It felt like it would be—the culmination of many months of friendship with Jaime. So many months of frustrating and increasingly uncontrollable sex dreams featuring the man across the hall…

She’d tried to control the dreams. _Oh, she’d tried._ For awhile, she’d listen to a podcast before bed that was supposed to help people sleep more soundly. The host had a terrible, droning voice that she had hoped would stifle any repressed urges that tried to creep in: intrusive thoughts and dreams of an inevitable disappointment she didn’t think she’d survive. _Jaime, naked and rising to greet the morning; the sun shining in from the large east-facing windows in his apartment—a spotlight on a god. In that light, he was golden._ When the podcast hadn’t worked, she’d tried to read about politics, willing herself to think of the President before bed, or the state of the world, though she felt guilty for relying on real-word problems to mask her own. 

Her imagination would always, inevitably, take her back to a bright field in the middle ages. _She’d be a knight on a fine grey palfrey sitting tall and brave in her saddle._ Renly would have made an admirable knight, too. She could almost see him—standing beside her horse in shining armor with a rainbow cloak—the sunlight picking up each and every bright color of it until there was nothing left but a white glow dissolving them both in light…

 _Was it offensive to think of him in a rainbow cloak?_ Renly would have laughed at her wonderings. “You’re the most P.C. person I’ve ever met,” He’d said to her one night after drinking and dancing and walking home across the Washington Avenue bridge in bare feet. Her heels had been too tight and painful to walk the four miles back to their dumpy post-college apartment. She’d asked him if it was offensive for her to do something so stupid and frivelous—walking home without shoes. What if she’d stepped on a piece of glass and had to use her health insurance? It was a privilege not afforded to many these days and it seemed stupid to even take the chance.

He’d laughed, teetering and tipsy but so sweet, and touched her face; he was the only one who could touch her. 

He’d said, “Even when you’re drunk, you’re thinking about others.” And, “You’re _good_ Brienne. Better than anyone.” 

So what if she’d stayed up half the night on her two-small twin bed after that, ignoring a raging stomach ache, wondering if being too politically correct was a bad thing. Wouldn’t it be better to rock the system? She’d always been an overthinker. She’d never been bold. Even now, 30 years old and lying on the floor of her apartment, the memories washing over her, all just a subconscious avoidance of the task at hand—her date with Jaime. 

* * *

_Renly had been bold._ She could almost see him dancing in the dark club, now. How many times a week did she think of that night? It was the night they’d met Loras and his sister Margaery and Renly had fallen instantly and idiotically in love with the taller, leaner man. Even to Brienne—it felt a bit cliche, but there had been something in the air that night, a palpable feeling of possibility that she could just barely still feel in her fingertips. It was a buzzing: hot and wild. _They were young then._ It had felt like anything could happen, even for ugly old Brienne. Stuffy, cautious Brienne. There had been a small glint of hope deep down, lit like a small fire in her belly. Maybe someday she’d find her own Loras. 

And if not, she’d at least have had Renly and the joy he’d found that night. For Renly every night would be _that night._ He was stuck in time, twenty-five for the rest of Brienne’s life. 

* * *

She was thirty now and still thinking about it: Renly dancing with Loras at the club on First Avenue. It had been eighties night and they’d danced to Depeche Mode and The Talking Heads and Blondie. 

_“Dreaming,”_ wasn’t that the song they’d been playing when she saw Loras go in for his first kiss?

Margaery, Loras’s sister, had pulled her away from the pair to get a Pabst Blue Ribbon (for Brienne) and a Gin and Tonic (for herself), her face mischievous and buoyant in the near darkness of the club. Margery flirted with the bartender until she got their drinks for free (though Brienne’s was practically free already, the sensible spender that she was). The two of them watched Renly and Loras dance for a long time; their arms touching as they leaned against the bar. They watched through the dense crowd—as Renly and Loras twirled each other around and back into each others’ arms again and again. She could still see it: the pair kissing feverishly to New Wave music until it became a little too R-rated for either of their tastes and they’d had to turn back to the bartender, giggling. 

The club had been packed and people had swarmed the dance floor like wasps. 

* * *

_Wasps._ They were like the angry colony of wasps that she and her older brother, Galladon had come across as young children, entertaining themselves in their backyard. Galladon had been eleven and wanted to be useful to their single father in some small way. Looking back now; it had been idiotic, for sure, how they’d decided to rid the backard of the little tubular nest hanging from a low branch of their bur oak climbing tree. Their father had been meaning to go after it for weeks, but had been too busy—as he often was—with work and running the house and they had not wanted to burden him with the reminder that he’d forgotten. So, Galladon had taken matters into his own hands, swatting the paper-thin nest with his baseball bat. It was funny now; to think of her big, gallant brother running to beat hell back to their house, an actual cloud of wasps not far behind and angry to boot.

It had not been funny at the time as they laid sweating and breathless on the cool linoleum floor of their kitchen, nursing each others’ wounds with smelly Camphor lotion. 

* * *

_Galladon. Wasps._ The people at the club had been akin to wasps or maybe more like the black flies you have to slap incessantly from your ankles every summer with great annoyance.  
  
They were flies she wanted to slap away to get a better glimpse of Renly and Loras, so obviously falling in love to The Smiths even though it was 2010 and not 1985. _How many people had fallen in love to The Smiths? What song had she fallen in love to?_

“Wild Horses” played over Jaime’s record player last July—the day the apartment’s air conditioner had gone out? A day so hot there had been absolutely nothing worth doing other than sprawling lazily over his couch in shorts and a tank top; Jaime shirtless and beautiful, of course. The music and hot air from the open window rolling over them like a hot all-encompassing wave. _Wave after wave_. The only thing that had kept her connected to time and place: the next track on the record she’d barely known. The feel of Jaime’s hand on her ankle, softly tapping out the rhythm. 

_Jesus, what decade was she living in, anyway?_ Did anyone fall in love to Spotify or Apple Music these days? 

* * *

Had she had much to drink yet? _Wine? Beer? A quart of 99 Bananas?_

She felt odd, unlike herself, the person she tried so hard to be: responsible, even, honorable. Was it honorable to lie on the floor in a mini-meltdown over not finding anything sufficient to wear for a first date? 

That is how she’d ended up here after all. She’d showered, shaved, picked and prodded; applied what little make up she always did, and smoothed back the straw-like hair that fell almost to her shoulders. She had been feeling resolute and resigned and ready to do the absurd—walk the five well-trodden steps to Jaime’s apartment across the hall for an official dinner date. They wouldn’t be able to go out as planned due to the snowstorm raging outside, but Jaime had begged her not to cancel in his text this morning. Perhaps it was better to have their first date in his apartment—the apartment they’d spent so much time in this year. It was unconventional, like their relationship. 

There would be no ruse this time. No excuse to see him. No, “Do you have a cup of almond milk I could borrow? Or, “Do you want to go for a run together today? I’m getting bored of my stationary bike…” 

There would be no more joking around in their undefined friendship, each of them finding more and more excuses to be near the other and to touch them. 

She thought of Jaime leaning in so close after a run through the fall streets, leaves heaped in musty piles in the gutters and on the sidewalks. He pulled a small, white moth from her hair. He’d shown it to her and then let it go, his hand reaching back up to softly graze where it had just been, his fingers slicking the hair back behind her ear. “You’re a flame for moths.” He’d said. _Was it her ugliness or the blue of her eyes that attracted them, so?_

* * *

No, things would change after tonight. It would be an acknowledgment, a long time coming, of their relationship—whatever it would end up being. Brienne lived a measured, careful life on purpose and this date was certainly going to throw things into chaos. 

_Chaos on a battlefield she could handle._ She’d always thought that. She would have been excellent with a mace on a long chain or a sword. Her body was made for a sword. 

Even in the real world, she was great under pressure. She’d used her self defense training to help another woman fend off a mugger who had been going for her purse and car keys, recently. There had been no choice: she was going to help. And no chance that she’d overthink things in the moment. She’d flown in yielding a big stick that she’d snapped off of a small city tree and whacked him across the back, finishing him with a roundhouse kick and a promise to gouge out his eyes if he didn’t stay still until the cops came. 

She’d been exhilarated after that, adrenaline pumping wildly. It was a new sensation that she’d experienced fleetingly during only the most vigorous workouts. She’d run up to Jaime’s apartment as soon as her interviews with the police were over and had known she would kiss him right then and there. Every step she’d taken up the four flights had her more sure. Her resolve was clear: now was the time to tell him she loved him...or at least kiss him, right? 

He’d thrown open the door and pulled her in so quickly she had been momentarily shaken off course. And, when she began to excitedly explain what had happened, he’d gotten angrier and angrier. She’d thought it was anger towards the mugger, but when she got closer to him and placed her hand on his cheek, trying to explain the sweet rush she’d felt, he had grabbed her hand and thrown it off, backing away for a few long seconds before rounding towards her, again. _A flame for moths._ “Why did you _do_ that?” he’d said through clenched teeth. “What if he’d had a gun. Or a knife?” 

Brienne had been so stunned; it was like he’d slapped her in the face. Didn’t he know she’d been as cautious as she could have been? Didn’t he understand what had been at stake for the other woman? 

When she thinks of it now, the embarrassment still smarts. She’d been about to kiss him, and sure—he hadn’t known, but still—she felt the shame of wanting something just for herself and being denied again and again. 

When had she ever done anything _just for her?_

She had hated Jaime’s anger and the palpable knowledge that she’d somehow let him down. She had not said a word to him, just spun back through his door. She hurried across the small hallway and into her own, loudly locking the door and sliding down, hands shaking, to sit with her back against the wood frame wondering if he was right behind it. Not caring if he was.

She’d cried of course. She could never help the vast emotions inside her—even if she could not always name them and tried to cover them, at times, with bizarre and comforting fantasies of knights and kings. 

She’d had bad dreams that night. Dreams she’d let him down, lost his magic sword. Woke up with the word, “oathkeeper” on her tongue and the unsettling feeling that she had been helpless and lost somewhere dark without him. 

They didn’t speak for two weeks after that. The dreams plagued her. She’d wonder, after waking, what “oathkeeper” meant. Was it a sword or a horse? _How would he look on a horse?_ Could they make a trip to the country someday and ride the trails? Camp in the dunes, together? 

He had been angry. Would she have sworn him an oath to never put herself in danger again if he’d asked? How could she deny him and yet…

 _No._ She would swear no oaths to him—wasn’t that at the heart of it all? She was her own person, had always been a solid, solitary force. A lone pine tree in a corn field. A female knight in an age that claimed men the only heroes. To swear oaths was to give up something of yourself and she’d already let so much go.

 _Renly. Galladon._ Her mother who she barely remembered but for a soft smell and a song. 

* * *

Renly had died in her arms five years ago. Or so a secret, horrible part of her longed for, now. She’d kill to be able to have spent those last moments with him. _Two knights: one a fool in love._ She would have lowered him to the ground in a clearing next to the battlefield where he’d died courageously. His armor heavy, their swords forgotten. _What had his last moments been like?_ She longed to touch him again, just the way he used to, wrapping her in his arms and teasing her with a kiss on the cheek. 

Brienne had not grown up with physical affection and neither had Renly. He had been the only one to open her up to it. Together they’d found love—in a different way. 

_And it was gone. A part of her gone._

It felt like someone had bitten a piece of her; she could see her flesh in someone else’s teeth. It was a bizarre vision but it always came to her along with the dull ache in her chest when she thought of him, now. 

Something was gone. _Gone._

But it hadn’t been like that at the end. Just a phone call from Margaery. _“Brienne, he’s gone.”_

* * *

Why did the cruel memories come to her so clearly as the good?

It was all jumbled up inside: the pain like a piece of flesh bitten off, a dagger to the chest, fingernails scratching and scratching, desperate to find purchase. Worst of all—the memory of Renly and the moment when she'd felt more alive and hopeful than ever—dancing with strangers in the darkness, a memory so sweet it burned like swallowed fire. All of it was gone; there was nothing left but the hateful reminer that she lived and they didn't. _What was left but to glorify the dead?_

Renly hadn’t been all wonderful in life. He was vain and could be ill-natured. Hadn’t she overheard him talking to Loras about how pitiful her crush on him was? Before she’d walked away, she’d heard Loras say, “She’s a solid two and you’re a ten,” laughing. No one was perfect and she didn’t fault him for it. 

Hadn’t they fought, too? She’d go into “silent mode” when angry—which she knew he hated more than anything else. They’d be forced to walk home together late at night after an argument, Renly talking a mile a minute, growing gradually more frustrated. She’d refuse to speak a word or even look down at him walking next to her.

There was even a time honourable Brienne flat-out refused to pay him for her share of their last electric bill before he moved out to join Loras across town. She’d made up some excuse: Renly and Loras had left damages that cost them their safety deposit. _Hadn’t she also kicked a hole in the wall?_ She’d just been showing off her newly acquired kickboxing skills, but still…

In truth, it was just spite over the fact that they were leaving her. 

* * *

Jaime had come to her after two weeks. Not through her front door, as she’d have been too angry to open it to him, but through the fire escape that connected the street to her living room window. The fire escape she kept her plants on in the summer.

She’d opened the window, thanking the gods she was dressed appropriately in a t-shirt and jeans and not something embarrassing like the tattered Mickey Mouse t-shirt Galladon had given her so long ago. Or something skimpier—underwear—as she was in the habit of eschewing clothes all together in the warmer days of fall. 

She’d opened the window and pulled him in, admonishing him for being stupid. “How did you get up here?” Code for: should one-handed men be climbing ancient metal ladders? 

He’d flashed a smirk and said, “You’d be _surprised_ what I can do with one hand and this forearm.” And then he’d closed the distance between them. _He was nervous,_ she’d thought, but still, he wrapped his arms around her and begged forgiveness. 

“I’m stupid and I’m sorry.” 

Of course he’d been forgiven long ago but she was too stubborn to mention it, had just patted his back and asked if he wanted a beer for his valiant efforts on the fire escape. 

He’d laughed, “Not a PBR, I hope?”


	2. Do Knights Throw Snowballs?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A visit from Margaery and some memories of Galladon and Jaime...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who is checking out this weird story! I promise "asshole Jaime" exists in this world---we're just not going linear with their storyline. More to come!

Jaime had come through her window that day like a vision from her dreams, but someone real was at the door now. She could hear the keys and the sound of the brass knob turning in her heavy oak door. _Margaery._

Margaery was the only person who had keys to her apartment and she used the privilege to abandon. She never knocked—didn’t matter the time of day—just came right in as if she was queen of the entire seven kingdoms. Brienne didn’t even bother to stand up off the hallway floor where she still sat. If anyone could appreciate dramatics, it was Margery. _Let her get her money’s worth!_ This meltdown was turning into a shit show of epic proportions, anyway. 

“Bri!” Margaery called cheerfully from the entryway. “It’s me! I thought the day would never come when you’d ask me for fashion advice, but it’s here now and I’m at your serv-”

“Brienne!” Margaery cut herself off and rushed to crouch next to her. 

_A big bumbling girl and a small dainty one,_ Brienne thought. They always did make an odd pair. 

“Brienne, are you ok?” There was so much concern in Margaery’s voice that Brienne couldn’t help but think back to their phone call from five years ago. The night Renly died, Brienne had thought it was a joke until she’d heard Margaery's soft crying on the other end of the line. Margaery always had words, but there were only a few spoken that night. 

Brienne felt instantly guilty for making her friend worry. Really, it was just a date. Just clothes. She was grateful Marg was there. She was a fixer and Bienne would let her dress her big body in a tight spandex mini dress at that moment—anything to ease Margaery’s fears. 

She sat a little straighter against the wall and patted the floor next to her. “I’m ok, really. I’m sorry if I made you upset. I just…” Brienne stumbled. “I just couldn’t find anything to wear and….”

“And it’s Renly’s birthday, today.” Margaery finished. 

“Happy Renly day.” Brienne said weakly. “How is Loras?”

Margaery placed her arm around Brienne’s shoulders—quite unlike her usual affection. They sat on the floor like two bros on a football field waiting for their turn to join the summer scrimmage. It was a “Renly gesture,” something he’d have done, and it didn’t go unnoticed by Brienne. She leaned in, crossing her larger arm around Margaery’s—two friends huddled in a dark corridor during a snowstorm. 

Margaery sighed, “He’s ok. It’s a hard day in some ways…but happy too, right?”

“Yes. Happy.” Brienne said. She smiled at her friend weakly before disentangling herself from Marg, crouching up just enough to look out the fire escape window that she could barely see from the hallway. 

“Holy shit, Marg!” The snow was coming down so hard, all she could see was white. A white sky and a city made unrecognizable by snow. “How did you even get here in this?”

Margaery laughed, “I took the bus, though I might have to crash with you tonight, I’m afraid.”

Brienne was aghast, “ _You_ took... _the bus_?” She must have really worried her with her S.O.S. text earlier. “Of course you can stay.” She said guiltily as she sat back down, ungracefully next to her. 

Margaery looked over and shot Brienne her most devious smile; her face slick and shining from the snow, her hair artful under her knit beret, her cheeks red from the cold, “I’ll probably have the place to myself anyway.” She smiled, “When I’m done dressing you, Jaime won’t let you leave his apartment, _ever again_!” 

Brienne’s own face was just as red as Marg’s, she knew, though she couldn’t blame the cold for her color.  
  


* * *

  
She thought of Galladon then and how much he’d loved the cold. So many winters with him: his favorite season.  
  
She and Galladon playing “Yeti” on the fifteen foot tall snow banks left by the plows near her childhood home. It was a game they always played. Galladon would pretend to be the Yeti and chase her up and down “the mountain” until they were both exhausted, collapsing to the ground to make lazy snow angels where the snow was lighter and less hard-packed. They dug tunnels through the snow and called them caves. He’d chase her up and down the docks, (pulled onto land for the winter) daring her to jump off of them into the white nothingness: into the soft snow below. 

Brienne had always felt whole with him—her real self. Even as a child, she’d been ugly in her own eyes: too tall, gangly, with hair that stuck out in every direction. Her father had never known what to do with it, though he’d tried.

There were many times Brienne had looked in the mirror and cried while her father attempted to tie up her hair in a ponytail or braid before school. “It’s not right!” She’d say, biting her tongue to keep from mentioning her mother. She’d always feel so guilty afterwards; he’d done his best and yet—it wasn’t enough for Brienne. She learned the guilt was far worse than the embarrassing hairstyles and so had cut it short and plain to make it more manageable for her and her father. 

_She wanted long hair, though. She always had._

But with Galladon she’d never felt she had to censor herself. He’d looked at her like she was his best friend, not an annoying, ugly little sister. For awhile they had been two buoys in a vast great lake: together barring the storm. Warning ships of the rocks up ahead.

Until he was gone, too.  
  


* * *

 _  
Galladon_ with his ruddy face, red from the cold, daring her to pee in her snowsuit. 'It was more convenient that way," he'd claimed. She wouldn’t have to hold it in on the long walk home or peel off layer upon layer of clothes when she got there. “It will dry!” He’d said, laughing.

She was always obedient, Brienne. So, of course she had walked home that day crying. Her snowsuit cold and frozen to her body. Galladon laughing so hard he’d fallen off their snow mountain, toppling over onto the fluffy snow below. He’d laughed until he’d noticed her tears were genuine and then had become worried. He hadn’t thought about just how cold it was and feared she’d freeze from being wet inside her clothes. He’d ran to catch up to her, stooping low so that she could jump on his back to carry her—piggy back style—all the way home, not caring if she was wet at all. 

_Galladon._ Laughing and perfect in her eyes. He too would always be that version of himself. At least Renly had lived long enough to fall in love, though it wasn’t much comfort, really. Galladon—drinking with his friends the summer he’d turned sixteen and Brienne had been eleven—drowned in a lake even though he was the strongest swimmer she’d known.   
  


* * *

  
Life was so stupid sometimes. 

We all lived on a sword's edge. Life was not a song. If Brienne had been a knight, she’d be a broken knight in a world at war: _no one knew what would come out at them from the woods at night; what it would mean when a horse broke its leg and it was the only transportation you had. How could you prepare for the battle of the long night without knowing what it was you were fighting? There were dead things hanging from the trees and voices from the ground, traitors in your bed, nooses at your neck, dragons in the sky, starving wolves forced to the mountains by a plague of coming snow. The only people to follow: broken men with wrong prophecies. If you knew the world was ending, how could you keep on living?_

It was easier to imagine life like that. No matter what dark stories she told herself to ease the grief, there was no reason for the things that happened and Brienne didn’t know if that was a comfort or a curse.  
  


* * *

 _  
Jaime had called her a knight once._ It had been winter then, too. Almost a year to the day. It had been January in the northern hemisphere and fifteen inches of snow had fallen in one weekend, leaving their cars horribly snowed in and iced over in the streets outside their apartment building. She’d rode up on her massive bike, it’s big, thick tires making it possible for her to ride all year long—minimizing her carbon footprint, too. She had stopped at their front door, taking time to untangle herself from the bike, readying for the long haul up four flights with the massive thing in tow. 

She hadn’t noticed anyone else there until she heard someone swear behind her and the distinct sound of a boot hitting a car, then predictably, more swearing. She’d spun around as if on guard and warily lifted the visor of her black motorcycle helmet (better than her regular bike helmet to keep out the harsh winter winds) and eyed the man up and down, only her impressive height and eyes visible through the wool balaclava she wore underneath. 

She’d seen Jaime—though she didn’t know his name then—and barely registered him as their new tenant. He was beautiful, anyone would notice that first. Golden hair halfway to his neck, muscular, eyes angry and green in the January sun. He was older than Brienne, but she couldn’t tell by how much. _Damn genetics._ She’d thought. He looked hopelessly underdressed for the weather and angry. He was shaking his leg as if to will away the pain he’d caused by kicking his own car in frustration with his measly hiking boots. 

Why wasn’t he wearing real boots? _The idiot,_ she’d thought. 

The man had seemed utterly hopeless, but if Brienne was anything it was a courteous neighbor, so she walked to his side and asked if he needed help shoveling out his car. He’d looked at her, right in the eyes— they were the same height— and seemed confused for a moment. She’d thought she heard him say, “Blue,” under his breath, but hadn’t been sure. 

Then his expression changed to anger and he turned his back on her. “Help? It seems I can’t do shit by myself anymore. I can barely drive let alone wield a shovel or ice scraper!” 

She looked down and noticed said ice scraper on the ground at their feet, obviously thrown in anger by this strange man. 

“It would help if you were dressed properly.” She’d said coolly, removing her helmet and balaclava and stooping to her knees to pick up the scraper.

“You’re a woman!” He’d said, eyes widening, “I hadn’t been sure, but thought there was a chance you were the tall, sulking woman from apartment 40-” 

He stopped when he had noticed Brienne on one knee, her helmet under one arm, her other hand reaching out with the ice scraper towards him.

“My knight in shining armor!” He said with a laugh that strangely did not annoy Brienne— at least not too much. She’d scoffed and placed the ice scraper in his left hand, noticing for the first time that his wool overcoat was hanging off one shoulder to accommodate his right arm which was in a sling at his chest. 

He noticed her staring and got angry again. “Can’t even shovel snow off a car anymore…” He mumbled under his breath. 

“Come on! That looks like a scrape. I’m sure you’ll be back in business in no time.” Brienne had nonchalantly said, moving to grab the shovel. 

He’d laughed: hard, sharp, and long. “If you call _an amputated hand_ a scrape...I guess so?” 

She’d gasped. 

“You’re so _big and gallant_ I’m sure you could lose two, three limbs, and still beat the shit out of me.” He said and turned his back, recommitting to scraping ice off the passenger side window with his wobbly, obviously less effective left hand.

“I’m sorry.” Brienne had gasped. “I was just trying to make a joke—I thought maybe it was a sprain..." She'd looked down at her gloved hands, "I’m not very funny.”   
  
He’d turned to her and winked. _Who winks! Had Brienne ever been winked at in her life?_

“Well, you made me laugh and I haven’t laughed in two months. Not since—”

He stopped. 

“Nevermind.” He continued. “Now, I don’t make it a habit of asking for help, but if my knight in shining armor wielding her _noble shovel_ would be so kind as to help me rid this damned car of snow—I’d appreciate it.” 

“I’m no knight.” She’d blushed, wishing for her balaclava so he wouldn't see how red and plain her face looked in the dry winter cold. 

“I suppose ladies can’t be knights.” He was thoughtful for a moment. “You’re a _lady_ knight, then!” 

Damn, this man and his idiotic ramblings and beautiful smile. _She’d do anything to make him smile,_ she’d realized, another blush rendering her instantly pink. 

She sighed, “If I were a real knight, then I’d have to kill any man who called me a _lady knight._ ” 

He’d laughed, “Ok, definitely no ‘lady knight.’ How about I call you…” He’d stopped and looked her up and down—it seemed deliberately—and for once Brienne didn’t shy from his gaze, her head held high. 

“Wench!” He’d said, satisfied with himself.

Or at least he had been until a mass of snow rained down on his head, dropped from Brienne’s shovel, coating him in slush and snow and city dirt. 

“ _Wench!_ ” He’d laughed. “I don’t know any knight who’d do _that_ to a poor old cripple.” 

She’d resolutely turned her back to him and began shoveling. “You’re not old and you’re not a cripple.”

She had no tolerance for the word, “cripple.” She heard him go back to his task and hoped she hadn’t said the wrong thing. She couldn’t believe she’d called his injury a “scrape.” She had almost given up all hope of a friendship with the strange, beautiful, one-handed man who intrigued her in such an odd way, when she felt a soft, wet splash on her back. 

“No, you’re right, Wench.” He said cheerfully as she spun around just in time to see him gearing up to throw another snowball with his raised left arm: “an old cripple wouldn’t do _this!”_

She'd laughed, ducking from the snow. “My name is Brienne,” She’d practically screamed, running up the steps to shelter from the odd man, until a feeling of giddiness and joy so sharp ran through her belly she half wondered if an icicle had fallen from the sky and gored her armorless middle. _I’m happy,_ she thought. 

She’d turned around to throw her own snowball Jaime’s way. _Why not embrace this madness,_ she thought as snow flew in every direction.  
  


* * *

 _  
Jaime._ Jaime who couldn’t shovel snow, cut his meat properly, or play hockey with her anymore. _But he could do so many other things._

She shivered in the hallway thinking about the cold. Could Jaime ride horses in the winter? She pictured him—handless, armorless, brushing snow off a big brown Destrier, lashes wet and begging for the warmth of a fire. 

“You’ll be a brave knight and I’ll be one-armed, useless squire following you on adventures, traipsing through the countryside until you're good and sick of me.” Jaime had joked with her later. _A knight no longer._

Did knights throw snowballs? Did knights fall in love with ugly girls?  
  


* * *

  
Margaery shook her a bit and moved to lay her head on Brienne’s shoulder, unusually affectionate still.  
  
“Do you remember the night we met? 80’s night?” She said.

Brienne choked and tried not to laugh. _Could she read minds?_ Brienne wouldn’t be surprised if she could, honestly. Margaery could “read people like the devil” or so her and Loras’ grandmother always liked to say.

“Of course I remember.” Brienne said. 

How many times had they talked of that night? It was shared lore to them now, though they had to be careful not to bring it up around Loras too often. 

“I’ve only seen love like that twice in my life.” Margaery said wistfully, sighing on Brienne’s shoulder. 

Brienne was curious, _“Twice?”_

Margaery lifted her head to look incredulously at her friend. She raised her eyebrows skyward for dramatic measure and sighed, “Brienne, for someone so ‘in your own head,’ you’re terribly dumb when it comes to _some things.”_

Brienne furrowed her brow and looked at her hands and Margaery continued, softer now: “I saw it once with Renly and Loras. That night they met.” 

_Yes._ They had all danced wildly, drunkenly. Brienne had been so happy for her friend she’d eschewed any self-consciousness about her body , about dancing, and had sought out strangers on the crowded dance floor. She willed them to make eye contact so that she could smile lavishly at them, sharing her happiness with everyone around her. The music, dancing, and alcohol raging through every pore of her body—the whole memory ripped-through with bliss and pain in equal measure.

Renly had pulled her away eventually to get another drink, stopping before they reached the bar. 

_“I’m happy, Brienne. I’m so happy.” He’d said_. 

“And I saw it a couple of weeks ago, too. I wasn’t sure I’d ever see it again, but I did.” Margaery said patting her head like she would a spoiled child. “You silly fool.” She said fondly, addressing the confusion on Brienne’s face. “It was your last hockey game.”   
  


* * *

  
Brienne played in an adult co-ed hockey league a couple of nights a week in the winter and they’d finished their season two weeks ago. You couldn’t grow up in a small town—in the part of the world where they did—and not have _some_ exposure to the sport. Brienne had always been a natural—graceful somehow, even when balanced on thin blades.

She and Galladon had spent many winters back home, skating their town’s small outdoor rink until the sky blackened and the few street lights turned off, encasing them in cold darkness. No one assumed there would be people roaming the streets at such an ungodly hour, so why waste the energy? They would play in the dark, their bodies fused to their sticks and skates; their brains hard-wired practically from birth to remember every inch of frozen water beneath their feet. To pressure them to come home, their father would have to call the house next to the modest skating rink, forcing the little boy who lived there to run to the ice in his snow boots and no coat screaming, “Time to go home!” 

_Jaime would never be able to play hockey with her._ With one hand, how could you hold a Sherwood stick, shifting back and forth—maneuvering the puck down the ice as fast as a shooting star?   
  


* * *

  
“I was sitting with Jaime in the stands,” Margaery continued. “God’s Brienne! You should have seen him. Every time your skates hit the ice, he practically vibrated out the door. I thought he’d spontaneously combust! I’ve never felt heat radiate off a man like that.” She waggled her eyebrows at her and Brienne rolled her eyes in return. 

“No _really,_ Brienne. Everytime you scored a goal, he’d jump onto the bleachers. I thought the family behind us was going to shit they were so mad.” She laughed, “And he’d be up there yelling your name and clapping his hand on his thigh so hard I thought he’d break his damn leg.” Margaery narrowed her eyes, “I _may_ recall that I finally had to remind him of what an _old man_ he is and that I wouldn’t be calling an ambulance if he gave himself a heart attack.” 

_“Margaery!”_ Brienne admonished.

“Don’t worry.” She laughed. “He’s not _that_ old. I just needed him to calm down so we wouldn't get nachos thrown at us!”

 _He had been happy that night,_ she remembered.

Brienne was always resolutely focused when caught up in the game. The only thing that mattered was the stick in her gloves, the puck on the ice, and the cold air on her cheeks as she skated toward the goal at warp speed. But even she had looked up every once in awhile to see him in the stands that night, cheering for her. It had given her a hell of a rush. She’d felt like she wasn’t playing hockey at all but doing acrobatics, flying over the crowd. A tightness in her belly and difficulty to breathe—like she was flying towards something she couldn’t be sure would catch her. 

“That’s just Jaime.” Brienne said. “He gets caught up in the competition.” 

Margaery looked almost angry then, “Brienne, no. There’s more. When you scored the winning goal…I don’t know how to explain it.” Brienne blushed. “But I watched you both from where I was sitting. He ran down the steps to get to you and you were _waiting for him,_ I think.” 

Brienne raised her eyebrows and Margaery laughed, “Yes, you’d both clearly forgotten about old Margaery.” 

Had she been waiting for him as she skated to her team’s bench and climbed the boards? _Yes, of course she had been._ Normally, she’d head to the locker room to change, meeting her friends after a shower. But she’d known Jaime was right behind the glass, grinning for her, and she’d abandoned the comforts of the locker room, had just put her skate guards on and walked to the lobby—a practical giant with the three extra inches of ice skates attached to her feet. She’d not had time to consider how sweaty she was or how smelly her breezers and pads were—well-used and secondhand—before Jaime ran to her. 

_For someone so old, he sure could make an awful fool of himself,_ she thought and blushed. 

Margary caught her smiling and laughed, too. “Do you get it, Brienne? _He loves you._ 100%.” 

He’d come to her that night, had almost collided with her but stopped in the nick of time. There had been a static spark in the air: the electricity you feel when you pull something out of the dryer and then touch the soft fur of a cat. He’d bent over slightly and wrapped his arms under her breezer pads and lifted her off the ground: skates and all. She could still barely believe that he’d lifted her at all. All she could do was laugh. “Put me down,” she’d screamed. 

But she hadn’t meant it. She had not been lifted by anyone in so long—not since Galladon, surely—it had made her feel not so _big_ for once in her life. 

Jaime had put her down with a grunt, but not after twirling her once in the air for good measure. 

“Wench, that was amazing!” he’d said, green eyes shining. She could see his breathe like a cloud in the coldness of the rink. _It had felt so warm._ She must have looked at him like he was a dragon come to life—ready to melt the ice and burn the whole damn place down—the surprise and confusion written on her face, because he’d taken her hand and said, “I’m just happy Brienne.” _So happy._


	3. What the Darkest Part of Her Wanted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More sadness and memories....but also some light smut! It can't all be grief, right!?

_I’m just happy, Brienne. I’m so happy._

Brienne didn’t believe in signs, but it had been unsettling to hear Jaime repeat the same words Renly had said eight years earlier. Jaime hadn’t understood why it untethered her, but it was almost as if they’d said it in unison in that moment, like two strips of film spliced and glued, edited together inside her: “I’m so happy.” 

Two different voices speaking the same words as loud and as clear as her own heart’s beating—blasting through time and space to play on a constant loop in the caverns of her chest. The words were lost in a room with no key, no adventure could solve the mystery of it. She wanted to feel happiness like Renly had that night. She wanted to give in to Jaime’s whims. _She wanted so much._ She felt alien, an extraterrestrial trying to decipher the golden record that fueled the Voyager spacecraft. No one understood how hard it was—letting herself be loved. How could you fall in love or even have children with the knowledge that death was waiting to take it all away? The experience of loving Jaime was just a free-fall into darkness, falling, falling. Her stomach dissolving into her throat. Her scalp tingling, coldness touching all of the exposed parts of her. It was a fire that began under her ribs, feeling warm. _Feeling good._ But the fire would spread all through her until she was lit up like a Chinese lantern and set loose into the Northern lights. She would be a constellation—alone but for the bridge of Magpies formed once in the lunar year. Love would be a brand and a scar, the last draw of water into your throat, a bite and a lost limb, a noose pulled tightly. The green of his eyes a lifeline cut with the sword he gave her. 

Happiness was a dream that she’d long ago forgotten. She could be happy in the way you were happy with friends: watching old movies from the 1950’s with Margaery and Loras on a Saturday night, or happy at work when she’d achieved a goal she set for herself, or helped make a difference in someone’s life. She had a full life and she was grateful for it. But happiness in love had been lost to Brienne the moment she realized the existence of her ugliness. The shame of it festered in her like a sickness. It was lost when her brother died, then Renly. 

She was too ugly to be a daughter. Too soft to be a son. Too broken to love any longer. _When would she be happy?  
  
_

* * *

  
Margaery attempted to pull Brienne up from the hallway, though all she could really do was pull listlessly, there was no way she could lift Brienne’s large body without her help. Brienne humored her all the same, pretending Margaery’s scrawny arms were making a difference combating the inertia of her vast body. 

“Okay. So. We need to find you something to wear.” She said, winking at Brienne and pulling weakly on her forearm, “Though there is literally _nothing_ you could wear that would scare this man off, I promise you.” 

Giving up on moving Brienne for the moment, Marg ran to the kitchen in a flash of long hair and energy, yelling, “But first: wine! We need to loosen you up!” 

Brienne sighed and joined her friend. _This was happening whether she was ready or not._

In the kitchen, Margaery poured the boxed white wine into two coffee mugs, only turning her nose up at the cheap merlot for a second. Brienne looked down at herself and noted (not for the first time) that she was still in her pajamas: ratty threadbare black leggings and an old sweatshirt of her father’s welcoming anyone who stared at the letters on her small breasts to the Grand Canyon.

“If only I could just wear pajamas.” she grumbled, listlessly pulling the fabric of her sweatshirt down to cover her ass. 

“So why don’t you?” Margaery said, smiling. “I think it’s cute! Text Jaime right now and tell him that you’re going to have a _pajama party!_ ”She sipped her wine as Brienne sighed and rolled her eyes. 

“It’s so very _hygge,_ Brienne.” Margaery laughed, gesturing to the snowstorm outside. 

“Better yet...I’ll do it for you!” Margaery shrieked over her shoulder while running for the blue iPhone she knew was Brienne’s before she could even register what was happening.

“What?! Marg—No! Let me think about it first!” She pleaded. 

“No way, girl. You’ve done too much thinking already.” Margaery put down the phone, looking slightly guilty. “Besides, it’s already done.”  
  
Brienne groaned and moved across the room on long legs, ready to assess the damage. If looks could kill, then Margaery would be six feet under by the time she was done glaring in her direction. Brienne wasn’t surprised to see that Jaime had texted back instantly:  
  


5:40 Me: _Can’t find anything to wear. Pajama party date?_

5:41 Annoying Neighbor: _Ok! I’ll wear those slippers you like! ;)_

5:42 Annoying Neighbor: _I’m looking forward to it. Wear whatever you want._

5:42 Annoying Neighbor: _Don’t worry! :)_

Brienne couldn’t help but smile. _He was sweet_. It would be too awkward to go back on her word, now and she would hate to have to admit that she was so worked up about this date, she’d had to call Margaery in for reinforcement. So what if she had to wear pajamas? They’d be just as good as anything else she had in her limited wardrobe. 

By the time she’d laid the phone back down, Margaery was already in her bedroom—closet door open, sweaters and jeans thrown to the side—Hurricane Margaery in full force. Brienne stood in the doorway, her head resting on the frame, shaking her fist halfheartedly in Marg’s direction, though Margaery was thoroughly unfazed.  
  
“How about this?” She handed Brienne a long pink sweater and blue, ribbed workout leggings.

“We are committed to a theme now,” Brienne teased, “and those don’t look _pajama_ enough.” 

As Brienne watched from the comfort of her own bed, Margaery flew through her closet and dresser drawers, pulling out sweater after sweater in a futile attempt to find something cute in the way of sleepwear. They both should have known how fruitless this silly idea would prove to be; Brienne was too practical to invest in cute pajamas. Margaery should have guessed that all she would find were old shorts, holey beyond repair, and too-large t-shirts—hand-me-downs from Brienne’s much larger brother and father. “Cute pajamas” seemed like an oxymoron to Brienne. Sleeping was the _least_ cute time. 

“Ugh.” Margaery crashed elegentally onto her back on Brienne’s bed to lay beside her. “Now _I’m_ overthinking this, damn it!” She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples, giving up just as Brienne knew she eventually would.

“I’m sorry.” Brienne said softly. “I know you’re trying your best. I’m just...broken. She turned her head to find Marg looking at her with furrowed brows, kind eyes. “Truthfully, I wouldn’t be comfortable in anything—you know that.” 

Marg flashed her a smile that was equally sympathetic as it was devious. “Then wear... _nothing._ ” 

Brienne threw a pillow at her friend, a little harder than she intended. 

* * *

She had allowed herself to imagine it once or twice—she and Jaime naked. 

She may be ugly, but she was still a woman. What would it be like to have him inside her? To kiss the stupid grin off his face? She’d suck on him like a jawbreaker, rolling him between her lips and tongue. Down, down, down that beautiful body, she’d kiss him...

She blushed thinking about how sexually tense it had been between them lately and how wet she’d become just sitting next to him on his couch, idly watching a movie. It wasn’t unusual for them to sit closer than friends should, now. So close, she didn’t know where his strong thigh ended and hers began, pressed against her. They were so similarly sized. Often, their legs would end up intertwined before she could think better of it. She would feel so relaxed, so safe, she’d even fall asleep next to him. Forget fucking, just sleeping next to him: _it was what the darkest part of her wanted._

Once, she’d woken up to him running his fingers through her hair. He hadn’t seemed to mind that she was crushing him, lying with her arms around his chest, her knee pulled up to his hard stomach, her cheek warm against his neck. He was breathing so heavily just lying there—it couldn’t have been on account of the mundane nature documentary they’d been watching. More than anything in that moment, she’d wanted to stroke his muscular chest, solid beneath her big hands, feel his nipple like a penny in her mouth. 

She wished she could have seen inside his brain, at that moment, to know for sure what he was thinking. How many nights had she cursed herself for not kissing him, then? Taking what she wanted. Her face was positively aflame when she remembered how she’d finally extracted herself from him to go to the bathroom. Her underwear was soaked through, insanely wet just from being near him. She’d had to wad them up in a tight ball and throw them in the garbage (hopefully hidden from Jaime) and had tried to remain composed when she’d walked back to the couch to finish the movie—commando. 

* * *

The whole miserable experience had proved wonderful fodder for her already sexually charged dreams, though. 

She dreamed so often of Jaime, blood hot from a battle, bursting through her door in a dark, cold castle somewhere, bringing the heat with him. They would have been apart for so long. _Gone to her._

_Jaime._

In her dreams, she never hesitated. They were meant to be together like two swords forged from an oath terribly kept. 

There would be fur and snow, wool garments and the golden shine of armor shed by firelight, the light reflecting off of it like an eclipse. _Don’t look directly at the sun._ She knew it would kill her, but she couldn’t bear not to look at his eyes, green and desperate—her name a gasp on a cold night, a cloud left in the air between them. Those lips. That smile as hot as wildfire. 

She’d pull him to her and they’d fall to the bed or the floor next to the hearth, his heart beating furiously against her cheek. It was always frantic in the way it would be if you’d just met death. His hand and mouth would be everywhere—in her hair, on her neck. Her ear would be in his teeth, her breasts begging for his touch, her long legs wrapped around him, pulling them even closer together, as close as they’d ever been. She’d wrap her big hands around the length of him and pray that they would never be separated again. The heat of it all, the absence of thought: all she could feel in the moment. There would be nothing but the fire of his breath on her skin, the feel of him inside her, A desperate oath on her tongue as she came, her eyes consuming them both in blue.

Brienne would wake up frustrated, her hands moving between her legs against her better judgment, thinking of Jaime with a red scabbard at his hip and that damned smile aimed her way. 

* * *

She’d been half mad lately, waiting for the dam to break. She’d never been more lustful— hated that her body betrayed her constantly. 

She wanted. _Wanted to for the first time in her life._ She felt desire roll in like an army of archers with blood in their eyes, aiming their arrows at her gut—the place heat and fire pooled every time she saw him. 

Love was a sort of grief. It was like being struck by dry lightning, left alive against the odds, but with an electric scar painted down your body. The shape of the bolt that nearly killed you a memento mori for the world to see. It was living with the fear you’d lose something: yourself, your desires, your control and all connection to the earth beneath your feet. Love was dark and scorching, something deep, deep inside breathing fire hot enough to kill you if you got too close to it, or let it stop or…

The madness of knowing, in the logical part of her brain, that this desire couldn’t last forever. People grew tired of each other everyday, and still: she was not able to stop this knight on his fine horse from bursting through the gate to kill her after she’d already opened it up to him. 

* * *

Brienne knew it was all delirium and it had to end. She knew that everything ended, and yet, she lived, still. 

_“I’m so happy.”_ Renly’s voice was as clear in her memory as if he’d said it today. She closed her eyes, could picture him there in her doorway— all charm and ease for life. He would have teased her endlessly about her dreams, demanding to know every gory detail. Would he have liked Jaime? Been happy for her? She and Margaery would scream and run to him. If he were here she’d never let him go.

Tears fell, she couldn’t help it. He was still so present. “ _I’m so happy.”_ He’d said and she knew she couldn’t deny those words any longer. 

Jaime had said them, too. When she remembered the words, she felt like a string of ugly paper dolls cut from leftover scraps of paper, mementos and cards from those that had left her, a piece of clear fishing line connecting each part of her scrapbooked self to the other version. She pictured a daughter then: hers and Jaime’s maybe. They were sitting in the warm light of a kitchen, both of them cutting paper snowflakes and dolls, colorful construction paper rings to make a chain. _“I’m so happy,” he said_. 

Renly had been vain, but she had loved him for it. It made him believe the foolhardy thoughts that only the beautiful could share without fear of ridicule. He’d asked Brienne once if she ever looked in the mirror, wondering what she’d look like in ten, fifteen, forty years. She couldn’t help but think of his question after he’d gone—how even that simple desire was taken from them all in an instant. No one would see Renly’s face wrinkled or old. She’d known she would always look closer at her own face from then on. _For Renly._

She could see it, unmistakable—an older version of Brienne walking in the city, catching her reflection in a store front window: her face just as ugly, the gray in her hair as evident as the clouds in the blue sky reflecting back to her, reflecting her eyes. She’d stop dead in her tracks, the memory of Renly’s idle musings coming back to her, unbidden. She would be older. Would Jaime be there, too? Jaime and a sweet child, born in the summer. Would their child have Galladon’s blue eyes? Jaime’s curls?

_I’m so happy, he’d said.  
  
_

* * *

Margaery had taken her hand, squeezing it gently as they both let the tears come.

“Let yourself be happy, Brienne. _Please.”_ Margaery begged. Brienne closed her eyes and squeezed her friend's hand once more. “And god dammit, get yourself laid tonight!” 

They laughed like they had as college girls, stupidly young, lying under their favorite Boxelder tree on campus, analyzing every detail of Renly and Loras’ new relationship or Marg’s love life. Brienne could feel the grass under her bare legs, still. She could hear Margaery’s endless chatter, the feel of her hand in her own. She could get lost in the joy of it—the semester over, the possibility of a party that night and a life ahead that seemed endless. Margaery would make her laugh, chronicling her tawdry adventures with some football player or another, until Brienne would spit her coffee out over the chemistry books they’d pretended to study. Through it all, they were still together. Even if they were older with a shared sadness between them fueling every day that they knew they were lucky to have. 

Brienne checked the time on her phone and rolled over slowly; she’d be meeting Jaime soon. She wiped the rest of her tears aside as she always did. She had battles left to fight and win. 

She always won in the end. _I’m so happy, he’d said._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone checking out this fic! I appreciate every comment and kudo. I know this one is sad, but I promise it will have a happy ending...eventually.


End file.
